Far Too Tempting

by Lauren Blakely

  We order the lunch special, brown rice, hamachi sashimi and miso soup for her, with the hamachi traded out for an avocado roll for me, since I’m a vegetarian. I give Kelly all the details and after my report, Kelly methodically tucks her blond hair behind her right ear, then shifts to the other side to be symmetrical. She takes a sip of miso soup and says, dragging it out, “But…”

  She knows we’ve arrived at the time to discuss the reason this lunch meeting was called in the first place. And it wasn’t to discuss my win.

  I take a long breath. “Aidan wants me to go to a meeting. His support group thing.”

  Her jaw drops. “Seriously? As if you’re a figurehead?”

  Sighing, I say, “I know. It sucks, because I’m obviously completely supportive of gay rights, gay marriages, and people should be free to love who they want. So there’s a part of me that feels as if I’m supposed to go. But then there’s this other side that wishes he’d be angry or bitter or catty. That he’d try to take advantage of me, and wheedle money out of me or something. Or try to claim a portion of my Crushed royalties. But nope, he has to be polite Aidan, gracious Aidan. And now he’s asking so nicely about this group and helping other women. Like telling me he was gay before he started dating Tom. Just a little courtesy heads-up. Hi, honey. We’ve been married for five years and have a kid. But I prefer dick. Wanted to let you know before I date Tom. Or Tooooom, I should say.”

  But the truth is, Aidan was sensitive. He was thoughtful when he broke my heart, as weird as that may sound. He didn’t come home drunk and smelling of another guy. I didn’t stumble across gay porn on his iPad. And I didn’t catch him having an affair with a man at the gym. But the night he came out was the worst night of my life. I was dumbstruck and broken at the same time. I can still recall that sense of shock that my Aidan, my love, was no longer mine. It’s been a year now and the good thing is I don’t hurt like I did then. The glaring, gaping wound has closed.

  And it’s about to be reopened, in a new, fresh way.

  “He says there are other women there going through the same thing. And that makes me wonder if I should go. To try to help or something,” I say with a help-me shrug, the words coming out all choppy, because I’m honestly not sure what to do. I’m a bleeding heart indie musician; I’m all about supporting causes.

  But still…

  Kelly sighs sympathetically. “That’s a tough one. On the one hand, you have no obligation whatsoever to go to a support group. You know that, right?”

  I nod, and she continues. “But on the other hand, you have such a good heart, and you’re always trying to help people. So maybe you go and you wind up helping some other women who are going through the pain you went through.”

  I shake my head, wishing I knew what to do. So much of my life is lived on stage that I want to find moments where I can just breathe and live quietly. But I also know that the way our marriage ended can cause a particular kind of doubt for a woman, can feed all sorts of insecurities. And I want to tell all the other women going through this—It’s Not Your Fault.

  But then, I was sure it was my fault.

  “Seeing as I don’t have a clue what to do, what do I even say to Aidan next time I see him?”

  Kelly tilts her head and furrows her brow, considering my question. Then her eyes brighten. “I got it! You need to give him a simple, but clear and completely diplomatic response. Same as you do when Star calls and you give them something harmless. Do the same with Aidan. Just say, ‘I have a lot on my plate, but I’m considering your request and will get back to you soon.’ Then, boom! Done!”

  I point a finger at her triumphantly. “See! That is yet another reason why I need you. For those kind of perfectly phrased answers to basically buy myself time.”

  “I’m sort of a wizard at this kind of thing. So now, let’s talk about something more pleasant. Like the delicious Brit,” Kelly says with a wink. Kelly makes it a priority to stay current on New York’s most eligible bachelors. The list includes Matthew Harrigan.

  I flash back to our conversation last night, to the ease of the banter, and then to the Grammys when he said I looked stunning. But yet, I don’t know if any of the things he says are true. “He’s only interested in a story,” I say, as much for Kelly as to remind myself not to entertain non-business thoughts of Matthew.

  “Doubtful. But even if that is the case, make him interested in more!”

  “I don’t think he’d be into me.”

  Kelly huffs. “Of course not. You’re only hot, smart, and a rock star. What’s to like? Can’t think of anything.”

  “He’s also married to his job. He’s completely career driven, so I’m sure he’s only being nice to me to get a story. Which is precisely why I can’t even let myself think about anything more than a story.”

  “But why not? He’s delectable. Anyone who tracks hot single men in New York knows he’s near the top of the list. So why can’t you consider him?”

  Because I’d get my heart broken again. Because he’d probably be harboring some secret too. Because the last seven years of my life turned out to be a lie.

  I shrug. “Call it a gut feeling. The question is—should I do the story? From a professional point of view only.”

  “It’s a chance to spend time with a baron. Of course,” Kelly says coyly, with a toss of her blond locks. She can’t resist royal possibilities.

  I shake my head, because she is relentless. “You don’t know for sure he’s a baron.”

  “He might not admit it publicly, but anyone who tracks these things knows he’s Baron Somerset.”

  “And you track these things, naturally, my Anglophile friend.”

  “Anglophile and peerage expert,” Kelly adds, referring to the system of titles in Britain. “My specialties are exercise, poker, and tracking royalty.”

  “Ha. Royalty. Is it really royalty?”

  “As close as we’ll ever come in America,” Kelly says. “So, do the story because it’ll be fun. Because maybe you can learn all sorts of juicy, yummy things about his lordship.”

  I laugh because Kelly has a way of turning uncertain situations on their head. Finding the fun in things. Finding the opportunities. In this case, Matthew had never publicly admitted it, but he supposedly hailed from quite noble lineage in England. His family owned gobs of land, and he’d inherited the title, as well as the rights to it. It was said that he preferred New York though, and rock ’n’ roll, rather than the lifestyle of a lord back in his homeland. So he kept his baronship as secret as he possibly could.

  But New York women have a way of finding out things that make men intriguing. And being a baron is one of those things.

  “Look at it this way. Your secrets are already out. You’re an open book. This can be a chance to find out his secrets. Potentially, very interesting secrets,” she says with a wink.

  Secrets can be alluring. But secrets can be devastating too.

  …

  My phone chirps as I leave Harajuku, and button up my coat.

  “It’s Jane,” I say, answering the call while heading across town to the Glass Slipper offices.

  “Jane Black, it’s Jayden Trent,” the reporter barks. “Star Magazine.”

  “Hi,” I say cautiously, wondering how Jayden managed to procure not only my home number, but now my cell. Bold little bastard. He’s persistent and, I must admit, I’m perversely impressed.

  “First, let me just say I feel for ya. My sister was just dumped by her boyfriend. He left her for his personal trainer. A dude.”

  I nearly stop in my tracks. I’d expected an attack given his tone and his relentlessness. But he’s strangely kind. “Sorry to hear that,” I say.

  “Yeah, she had no idea. He was a local city councilman, too. Kept it quiet for a long time.”

  “That’s rough. I hope she’s hanging in there,” I say, feeling kinship for his sister instantly as I walk down the street. Maybe I should go to Aidan’s meeting.

  “Yeah,” Jay
den says with a what-can-you-do wistfulness in his rough voice. “Anyway, between her and you I figured it was time to do a short little piece. Did you have any clue? I gotta be direct here,” he says, but he doesn’t come across as abrasive. More like curious. “Did you just not know at all?”

  It’s a question I have asked myself innumerable times, on countless occasions, when I’m awake, when I’m asleep, when I’m dreaming, when I’m breathing.

  A few months ago, I read a magazine article called, “Is My Boyfriend Gay?”

  Aidan had already come out, but I wanted to see if there were signs, things I had missed, markers that might have been useful. Besides the obvious stuff—he doesn’t like having sex with you, especially touching you between your legs—most of the signs were laughable. Gay men are more likely to have hair that whorls counterclockwise, to have an index finger longer than the ring finger, and to have older brothers, the article said. Aside from Aidan’s collection of older male siblings, I’m pretty sure that even if I had walked around our marriage inspecting his hair and measuring his finger length that I wouldn’t have put two and two together. Besides, another thing that’s common with married gay men is they often make great husbands because they try so hard to live a straight life, while denying their sexuality. For better or for worse, Aidan was a perfect husband. He was kind, he was supportive, he believed in me. He complimented me every day. He cooked for me. He always took care of Ethan when I had a gig and never once complained about the odd hours a musician keeps.

  Kelly’s comments about being able to help other women going through this echo within me, and before I know it, I’m speaking from the heart, saying to Jayden, “Actually, I’ve asked myself that question a lot. Countless times. I felt pretty stupid. And I beat myself up a lot for not having known. But the fact is, I was pregnant with his child and I desperately wanted my marriage to work.”

  We talk for another few minutes and then Jayden thanks me for my time.

  After I hang up, I remember Matthew’s advice to be myself. I don’t know if he’s right or not, I don’t know if he fed me a handy line reporters use to get people to open up to them. But at the end of the day, I don’t want to be false; I don’t want to be phony. I spoke the simple truth to Jayden, and I think he appreciated it.

  As I turn onto Jeremy’s block, I noodle on all these interactions with reporters. On trying to be myself. On answering honestly. Is there a song in there? Maybe it’s a stretch, but I need something, anything, to get my creative engine rumbling along. So I hum a loose little melody—just be yourself, be who you are, speak the truth.

  But it sounds so treacly, it makes me want to yak up my sushi lunch. Clearly, there’s no song in answering a reporter’s question honestly. Then I lose my train of thought when I notice a pair of teenagers practically stumbling out of Starbucks, hanging onto each other, a boy and a girl, each with a hand in the other’s back pocket. He reaches across her with his free hand, pushing a strand of her blond hair behind her ear, then lays a quick, but not too quick, kiss on her lips. They gaze at each other—they actually gaze; who gazes anymore?—and then dash off toward the nearest subway, I imagine, to catch a train to a make-out hideaway somewhere.

  It’s like a punch in the gut, a sharp, cold reminder that Aidan and I never staggered out of a coffee shop in midday, woozy on our love, giddy with the prospect of pending nakedness. These scenes of public affection bear about as much similarity to my marriage as Japanese or differential calculus do. But I want what the Starbucks Couple has. I want someone to want me. I want to be desired, I want to be admired, I want to be adored. The gal who cuts my hair has a tattoo across her right arm in a cool cursive font that says, “I want to be adored.” I love that tattoo, I love the earnestness of the sentiment, I love her ballsiness in branding it on her body.

  I’m not afraid of tattoos, or piercings for that matter. I have both—a belly button ring and a tattoo on my ankle. The tattoo is a small, silvery illustration of a glass slipper. Jeremy’s a former tattoo artist; he launched the label when a wealthy customer died, leaving his inker with a hefty chunk of change in the will. Jeremy handed the key of the tattoo shop to his younger brother and pursued his lifelong dream—to run a record label. After I signed with the label, his brother inked me and I surprised Jeremy with it a few days later when I showed him my ankle. He knows I’ll never leave him, even though other labels called me after Crushed shot up the charts to see if I’d jump ship. I said no. My loyalty is on my skin.

  But I push tattoos and teenage desire out of my mind as I open the door to the Glass Slipper offices, in the heart of the garment district on the seventh floor of your average, ordinary, completely unremarkable Manhattan office building. Jeremy wanted to name the label Gnarled Sunrise, but his wife liked Glass Slipper better, so he deferred to her, though he christened the accompanying recording studio with his name of choice. The walls are plastered with album covers, music posters, magazine reviews. I spend the next hour eating the most amazing chocolate cake with butter cream frosting from Kara’s Kake Saloon a few blocks away and chatting with the label’s fifteen full-time employees and a handful of freelance sound mixers and producers who work regularly with the label’s acts.

  The great thing about working for an indie is just that—working for an indie. Glass Slipper is smaller, eons smaller, than the Capitols and Islands and Virgin Records of the world. We don’t have the money, the staff, or the resources of the big guys. But, there’s tremendous freedom and faith. I asked Jeremy once why he stuck with me after my first three albums, when most big labels would have dropped me. I remember him leaning back in his creaky desk chair, placing his meaty, inked arms—covered in dragons, Chinese characters for good fortune and health, and the names of his three kids—behind his head.

  “I liked you,” he said. “I knew eventually you’d produce something great. You were like this diamond in the rough.”

  “A lot of rough.”

  “A lotta, lotta rough,” he added with a hearty chuckle.

  I finish my cake and head into Jeremy’s office with Owen close behind. He works with some of the other Glass Slipper acts, but he also seems to spend a fair amount of time in coffee shops with his laptop working on his novel. It’s a gritty, urban tale of a young woman who moves to New York determined to find a boy who worked at the Museum of Natural History when she visited it in high school, only to learn he’s now a ghost. Or so Owen tells me. He won’t show it to anyone besides his writer’s group.

  “You know that’s the last cake we’re going to let you eat,” Jeremy says in an offhand way, settling into his creaky chair.

  “Yeah,” Owen chimes in. “We talked about it earlier and you’re going to have to become a size zero now that you’re a star.”

  I look at the two of them quizzically and hold my hands up in the air. “It’s not like I’m a chubster now,” I say, then pinch my flat belly for emphasis. “See, nothing there.”

  “I don’t know, sis. Looks like there’s a little meat on your bones. You know there are expectations now,” Owen says.

  Jeremy tries his best to hide a give-away smile.

  “Oh, ha, ha. Very funny. Give me a complex why don’t you? I think size six, four on a good day, is just fine.”

  “Of course it is. And speaking of”—Jeremy reaches for a packet of white envelopes on his desk—“I’d really rather fatten you up.”

  He hands me the envelopes.

  “What’s this?” I ask.

  “Open,” he says in his gruff voice. I do as directed and find gift certificates for Café Cluny in the West Village, Per Se in the Time Warner Center, Aureole where the tony Upper East Side begins and many, many more.

  “Jeremy.” I’m touched and totally surprised.

  “Look, it’s not like you’d want champagne or a party with all of us at some stupid place. Or any more goddamn records or iTunes gift certificates. I swear if I get another iTunes gift card I’m gonna scream. I have a million already.”

/>   “You could start giving them to the homeless, Jeremy. Let them sell them at half price. Could be your charitable contribution for the year,” Owen says.

  “Enjoy some nice meals out, maybe find a nice boy to take to dinner,” Jeremy says.

  I snort at that idea.

  “What?” Jeremy asks. “Is that such a crazy idea?”

  I snort twice to prove my point.

  “You can’t mourn him forever, sis,” Owen says.

  “I’m not in mourning. Anyway, this is a lovely gift, Jeremy. And I will be delighted to eat at Manhattan’s finest.”

  “Well, we can’t have our Grammy winner be seen dining at some dive, right?” he says in his teasing voice. Then shifts to a gruff one. “So what’s the story, Black? You made any progress on some new tunes?”

  Gulp.

  Jeremy doesn’t mince words. Not anymore at least. Before the Grammy Awards, he was lighthearted when he’d ask what I was working on. And the fact that he wants another album makes me giddy as all hell, because this is what I’ve wanted my whole life over—to make music. But what if my next album sucks? I love music like it’s air, and I desperately don’t want to be a one-hit wonder.

  “Yeah,” I say, bluffing. “I’ve been toying with some possibilities.”

  He raises an eyebrow. “Yeah? What sort of possibilities?”

  “You know. Songs. Lyrics,” I say evasively. God, where the hell is my Muse? Maybe she’s under my bed hiding. Maybe she’s hanging out in Central Park feeding the ducks. I need to go hunt that bitch down.

  With a sharp-eyed stare, Jeremy holds his hands out wide. “Well, can we hear some of these songs and lyrics? Because I’m kinda eager”—he stops to hold up his thumb and index finger to show a sliver of space—“for my first Grammy winner and most successful artist ever, who set an indie record, to make another album.”

  “Soon,” I mutter, fidgeting with the zipper on my purse. I know I’m the luckiest person in the world to have a label that wants me to cut another album, but I’m terrified I won’t live up to all these new expectations. And I’m embarrassed that I’m not meeting them. Sure, I’ve been toying around with some tunes. I’ve written two or three so-so songs, but I’ve been so crazy busy the last few months with Crushed and its tour, not to mention being a mom, that I haven’t had a ton of free time to write. And truth be told, those three songs aren’t really wowing me. They just don’t pack the same punch as the songs on Crushed, and I’m not sure why.